A Movie Script Ending
by hell-whim
Summary: They meet at midnight, cloak and dagger, beneath the light pole in front of her building. Post Impact Winter


**Title:** A Movie Script Ending

**Author:** freak-pudding

**Disclaimer:** _The West Wing_ and all associated articles are the sole property of Aaron Sorkin and NBC. No copyright infringement intended.

**Summary:** They meet at midnight, cloak and dagger, beneath the light pole in front of her building. Post-_Impact Winter_

**Archive:** Ask and ye shall receive.

**Author's Notes:** You know, I've never seen _Wicker Park_, but it has an amazing soundtrack. Emo is my lifeblood. Also, listen to _Swing Life Away_. I think you'll have a new appreciation for this afterwards.

They meet at midnight, cloak and dagger, beneath the light pole in front of her building.

He feels clandestine and retarded, leaning against the fender and breathing into his cupped hands, trying to get warm.

There's no snow for snowballs.

"My kingdom for a scarf," he whispers, shivering. A cardboard box rests at his feet, packed to the brim with paraphernalia. It hurts too much to think of it as anything else.

She's thirty-seven minutes late when the door finally bangs open. He launches upright, pushes off the car, lifts his eyes from the concrete.

Golden light pours from the doorway behind her; the mournful chords of a soft-rock Christmas carol weave a wispy trail through the air as she moves.

"You're late," he says quietly. She stops just steps away, carrying a crate of her own.

"I'm having a party," she replies, as though the lights and laughter and gaiety of the well-lit windows in the building behind her didn't attest to that. "It was kinda last-minute."

He nods slowly, coughs into one hand.

"You said you wanted to see me?" she prompts impatiently.

"Oh, yeah, uh—"

He prods the box with a foot, self-conscious.

"There were some things, at my apartment…some of your things that you just—"

"You left some things here, too."

There's a pause, a sickening moment of hesitation before she thrusts the box at him.

"Here," she says, a shiver catching the end of her words.

He takes it carefully, glances at the contents. Shirts, pants, a tie or two, a few CDs. He sets it down beside the tire, bends and picks up his own box, holds it out to her.

He tries not to notice the way she won't let their fingers brush when she finally takes it.

She sets it down, and then they're standing there, in the cold, together and apart, and he shifts and sighs and clears his throat. She keeps her thin arms wrapped tightly around her torso, staring down at the frosted grass between their feet.

"I kept some things," he hears himself saying.

"What?"

He winces, embarrassed, but goes on.

"Some of your things. I kept some of…there was a coffee mug and some movies that I didn't think…"

She nods slowly, and he wishes she'd look at him just once.

"I kept some of your things, too," she replies, soft and quiet, like she thinks the cold will muffle it. "There was shirt, and—"

"That's fine," he cuts in, definite and too scared to let her keep going.

They stand there in a pool of ivory light, shaking and angry and scared and hurt all at once. Josh watches her shiver, the slight tremble of her slowly reddening hands.

"You came out here without a coat on."

And he doesn't quite know why he said it, isn't quite sure what he's doing until Donna's voice stops him, sharp and cold.

"I don't need anything from you."

He shrugs his coat back up on his shoulders, ready to lash out.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Josh…"

"No, I wanna know. What the hell is that supposed to mean? You don't _need_ anything from me? What the hell is—?"

"I just meant—"

"What, that I'm not _enough_?"

And he stops, looks up and then down, shoves his hands deeper into his pockets, hunches his shoulders beneath his jacket.

"That isn't what I meant."

"Yes, it is."

"No, it isn't, Josh. Not everything needs to be about _you_."

"It's not about me, Donna. This is about you."

She stands straighter, flips a bit of hair out of her face.

"Yes," she agrees. "It is. I want to do more."

"I gave you more."

"No, you didn't, Josh. You kept me down at the bottom because that was where I served you best!"

"No, I kept you away from some things because the last time I tried to give you more, you were in a car bombing and almost died!"

He breathes into his cupped hands, cursing himself for not bringing gloves. He hopes she thinks it's the cold that's making his eyes water.

"That isn't why you sent me to Gaza."

"Isn't it?"

"If you had been giving me every opportunity—"

The memory of CJ's eloquent argument evaporates as she watches him.

"What was I supposed to do, Donna? You never graduated college. How would it look if I just gave you promotion after promotion, giving—?"

He stops yelling, shoves his fingers in his eyes, rubbing rapidly. The music pounds from inside the building, a parallel to the throbbing in his head.

"That's not why I came here."

"Really."

"Yes. I just…I was just returning your stuff."

"Except for certain things."

It's a sickening kind of power she has, the way her words draw that old, buried pain back up inside him, that glare he gives her when he looks up.

"You really wanna do this. Here, in the middle of the damn street?"

A chorus of laughter flows from the window; Donna casts one quick look over her shoulder.

"Josh, I've got—

"Fine! Let's compare, shall we?"

"Josh…"

She sighs, looks to the side.

"No! No, no, no, no. Let's do this now, Donna."

"Josh."

"Let's compare scars," he sneers, cold and unequivocal. "You wanna see whose are worse?"

She flinches, draws in a breath, and he stops.

"I'm sorry."

"It's okay," she says, one hand against her mouth, the other raising, halting his slight step toward her.

"God, Donna, I'm—" he mouths a moment, inarticulate. "I'm so sorry; I didn't mean to—"

There are tears glittering along her lashes as she turns her face away.

"Let's not do this, okay?"

He's looking down, and it's now that he really realizes what's happened to them.

"I'm sorry," he repeats. "I shouldn't have said that. I just…I don't know…"

He trails off, thinking, wondering, confused.

"I don't know what's wrong with me today."

"Would you like a list?"

"What the hell is—?"

"What do you want from me, Josh?"

"A reason."

"You don't get one."

"Why?"

"Because."

She crosses her arms, staring him down.

"That's not an answer."

"I don't really care."

He scoffs, looks down at both their feet, tilts his head.

"This is how it is, then," he says. "This is how it ends between us."

"Yeah," she sighs because there's nothing else to say. He knows that it's over, and he should turn away and leave, but it hurts too badly, and he's been hiding it for so long.

"Don't do this, Donna. I _need_ you."

"You need an assistant, Josh. And I can't be that girl anymore."

"You—"

He stops then, cuts himself off. They've talked in circles for years, coming so close and straying so far and almost telling the truth, and he thinks it's the _almost_ that almost rips him up deep inside. He looks up from his hands, finds her eyes finally staring into his own.

It's really over, and this is how he's always known it was going to end.

"What do you want from me?" he whispers.

Her lower lip trembles, fingers squeezing her sides.

"Give me back the last seven years of my life."

A tear, crystalline, falls onto the frost.

"I can't give you that."

And he turns then, staggers back to the car and fumbles for the door. Hears the door open and close behind him as she retreats inside, and he stifles the tears into the sleeve of his jacket.

He wants to turn back, tell her she can't just leave, can't just get rid of him like that. And he wants her to open the door, let him in, stand in shock as he sweeps her up and kisses her hard, right in front of everyone. He wants to be standing outside in the snow, shouting her name and calling her amazing.

Josh takes a breath, a sigh, and opens the car door. He slides onto the seat and turns the key, flips the headlights and signals a turn. He pulls away from the curb, glancing once in the side mirror. No rearview today.

And he wants to pretend it means nothing when he comes back at dawn and leaves a little blue box on her steps, a single note of _Donnatella_ pinned to the top. He wants to think he didn't stand there, under her window, watching the sun rise.


End file.
